Peter Fimrite, Chronicle Staff Writer Sunday, November 9, 2008
It was a spring day in 1957 when a dashing fellow with dark, wavy hair looked up from Yosemite Valley at the soaring cliffs and vowed to do what no human had ever done.
Scaling the colossal, 3,000-foot-tall granite cliff known as El Capitan was something most people regarded as beyond the capability of humans, but when Warren Harding had a mind to do something, he did it.
It took Harding, Wayne Merry and George Whitmore 47 days of climbing over 16 months to turn what had seemed like a fantasy into a reality.
The first ascent of El Capitan 50 years ago was one of the greatest climbing achievements in history. That is why Merry, Whitmore and many of the legends of Yosemite climbing have gotten together this weekend to celebrate the anniversary of that day a half-century ago.
"I am extremely honored, and I feel almost a little embarrassed because I don't think we deserve this much," Merry said Saturday after a gathering of some 150 people, including Harding's celebrated onetime rival, Royal Robbins. "It is really rewarding to get this kind of reunion under your belt after 50 years."
Six of the nine climbers involved in the first ascent told tales, narrated slide shows of their exploits and drank red wine in honor of the hard-driving, devilish Harding, who died in 2002.
